Three Tips for Holiday Peace

‘tis the season to be joyful? Sad but true, while there’s much to love about holidays, many people find this an intensely difficult time. While it’s unlikely that we can change the in-laws’ behavior, or instantly restore a damaged relationship, or bring back a loved one we miss most these days… perhaps we can approach holiday stress in a new way this year.

When my kids were little, their school had a beautiful song, “Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me.” While sometimes it feels better, in a perverse way, to escalate the frustration and disappointment and overwhelm, here are three techniques to radically shift direction.

1. Unwrap Layers of Feelings

Have you ever played the gift game where a present is wrapped in many layers of paper; you pass the gifts around, each person unwrapping one layer ‘till you finally get to the prize. This is a metaphor for exploring our own feelings.

You’re going batty because of your sister Suzie’s constant comments about how your cranberry sauce isn’t quite right. You could stay focused on this outer layer, complain to your spouse and cousin Sasha and everyone who will listen… but in a flash of EQ inspired curiosity, you think, “maybe there’s more to the story?”

So you “unwrap” that surface feeling asking yourself what else you’re feeling, and see that underneath is a sense of inadequacy – no, you’re not perfect. Damn Suzie for reminding you. Again.

Yet on reflection, hiding under that is a feeling of helplessness because you wish you could actually have a good relationship with Suzie. But don’t stop there, because the next layer is a deep longing and love of family. And is that a tiny glimmer of hope?

This process of seeing the feelings under the feelings is a recognition of the complex blend of our experiences. While this can seem overwhelming, it also creates emotional opportunity. We can amplify any of those feelings by putting our attention to that layer.

2. Sprinkle Lights of Possibility

Tradition is so lovely from a distance, but up close, it sucks us into a trap. We did it this way, so we’ll do it this way again. We become prisoners of the patterns and fall into a kind of passive-resistant whining. Are we choosing our lives, or have we become idle passengers letting life happen to us?

Yes, it’s probably easier to surrender to a mind-numb dread-of-holidays helplessness (fuelled, no doubt, by the onslaught of over-bright holiday sweaters). “Honey, do we HAVE to go to the Jones’ party AGAIN?” “Well, we always go…” I can hear my own petulance, and wince. You too?

What if we treat all these experiences, especially days with lots to juggle, as opportunities to try something new?

What if each of these moments of challenge as a kind of game: “Where can sprinkle cheer today?” Seeking out opportunities for kindness, optimism, and levity causes us to focus less on the problem and more on our own efficacy. As we become more capable of redirecting the situations, we rediscover that we do, in fact, have the power to set our own course through the seas of tradition.

You know how, especially as snow is falling, holiday lights become these blurry glowing splashes of color? That’s a metaphor for this exercise.

3. Follow the Star of Wonder

As a boy, I loved Christmas caroling. Feeling the warmth of a candle on the cold night, being together, spreading cheer. I especially liked, “We Three Kings.” I loved my stepdad’s and grandfather’s rumbling bass on lines like, “Myrrh is mine: it’s bitter perfume / Breathes a life of gathering gloom.” Of course it’s the chorus that we all could sing together, “O star of wonder, star of night, Star with royal beauty bright…”

What is the “star” for you?

In the frazzle of shopping and cooking, it’s easy to lose sight of the why. The rituals become empty, and, as I wrote above, we get stuck in tradition. Yet underneath all that, each of us has some reason we’re participating (or not participating — even resistance is a sign of engagement in something).

The challenge is to keep the meaning present. To keep reminding ourselves, and one another, that we’re doing this for a reason. Why are you celebrating, or not celebrating? Why are you polishing that silver, or having a big party, or having a quiet evening around the fire… not the obvious answer, not “because that’s what we do” or “everyone else does,” or even “it’s tradition.”

Now the hard part: Can you connect your daily tasks with that larger meaning? Can you see and articulate the “why” behind the baking and scrubbing and shopping and even that “bold” sweater with the blinking Rudolf nose? (That’s the advanced challenge.)

As you walk through this process, over and over, you’ll find that you’re more and more able to do what you really mean to do. You’ll become better and better at creating peace, each of us starting with ourselves.

Joshua is one of the world’s preeminent experts on developing emotional intelligence to create positive change. With warmth and authenticity, he translates leading-edge science into practical, applicable terms that improve the quality of relationships to unlock enduring success. Joshua leads the world’s largest network of emotional intelligence practitioners and researchers.

To me these three tips understood well. In my opinion emotional intelligence has a layered structure. The bottom layer is the tradition. The middle layer feelings. The top layer aspirations. Me and my colleagues are working on this. And we are happy to congratulate everyone in the whole world with new year and Christmas. We, your colleagues from crowdintell wish all to improve their lives through emotional intelligence as offers all of us Joshua Freedman and 6seconds

These tips are so meaningful and helpful for this time of year. Just yesterday, I received a text message from my daughter (now a mom of 3) to say that she would be cooking the turkey and making the dressing for this year. I was a bit taken aback (and a little hurt) since this has always my job. Within moments, as I was taking time to breathe and work through my feelings, a colleague happened to come by my desk. She is a young mom just like my daughter and when I asked about their Christmas plans; she proceeded to say that she was feeling a bit nervous as she wanted to cook her own Christmas dinner this year because she wanted to start traditions for her own family but she was worried about hurting her mom’s feelings. She had no idea that I had been struggling with that very thing just a few minutes earlier. That conversation was not an accident! It helped me to understand that my daughter wanted to do this for her family in the same way I had done it for mine. It put a totally different perspective on things for me – it was not personal! I responded to my daughter’s text telling her what a wonderful mom she was and that I would be happy to help in any way or to just “play with the kids” while she made Chrismas dinner. Have a wonderful Christmas. May 2014 bring peace, good health and joy to all.

Joshua, thanks for this piece of wisdom. The concept of changing traditions particularly resonates with us. Many of us find this season stressful as we do get stranded in traditions that may no longer be as relevant as they were at one time (such as when our children were young). All the best to you and yours!

Great Josh! I have just come back from sharing with over 1000 head teachers on the need to focus on EQ in forming our young ones and saving our future. The discuss was most fulfilling for us and I cant wait to share more with experts on this field in conferences.
Great season of emotion to us all.

As always…a wonderful article and very timely for me as I am struggling to come to terms with a lot of changes in my life. Could you please send me the candle image as a separate file to my email ([email protected]) as I would like to have it as my cover image for my facebook page (only if it is OK with you. Once again thank you for all your share and care and happy holidays!

Indeed a very inspiring article this time of the year! I just love the metaphor you used to deal with holidays in a difference manner.. in a way that would make those days worth remembering, fused with love and emotions.. However, I would be concerned if someone who is not deeply aware of the emotional intelligence concept and six seconds’ amazing EQ model trying to introduce these great ideas into their yearly traditions. Especially the Layers of feelings ! I personally like it so much and will use it with my family and friends .. but I would be doing this excercise very carefully, otherwise the possibility to create a conflict might be there (in my openion) if the excercise was not performed by an EQ believer and an excellent facilitator.
Our lovely mother Gates was Emotionally Intelligent enough to give herself the chance to navigate her emotions, apply some consequential thinking on the impact on her daughter’s life as a young mother, and respond in a positive way that certainly serves her noble goal as an amazing mother who would not let her personal ego stand in the way of her daughter’s growth and continuous improvement, which will have an incredible impact on the whole family! Gates, you are a great mother !
Unless we are confident that we can apply some of your great ideas Josh for this Christmas, where it will create Peace and love.. without hurting someone we love just to prove a point .. then everybody (with enough EQ knowledge and awareness) who would apply some of your great ideas will be helping change holidays to a more precious, positive, joyful time of the year 🙂

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